Wednesday, March 20, 2013

Sherpa – A member of
a people of Tibetan stock living in the Nepalese Himalayas, who often serve as
porters for mountain climbing expeditions.

Two days ago, The New York Timesran a
story “The Doctor Is In (Well. Logged in” on Jay Parkinson. MD, CEO and
co-founder of Sherpaa, a web site that operates like a virtual physician’s
office, examining patients by email, photographs, and text messages, without
physically touching them or examining them.

Well. Maybe.Anyway, founded in 2012, Sherpaa now has 8
employees, including two primary care physicians and refers to a network of 100
specialists.Sherpaa charges $50 a month
to each employee of a company and claims it can save companies $4000 a year for
each employee.

Sherpaa is aptly named,for it serves as porter (and a portal) to
help patients up that mountain top of virtual medicine.Dr. Parkinson just might make it.He certainly has a knack for publicity.Go to Internet Explorer, and you will find at
least 50 entries under his name.If you’re
interested,you might even want to visit
his blog, jayparkinsonmd.com.

My interest in Dr. Parkinson is more
than just passing.Five years ago, when
he was inhis Internet diapers,I wrote the following blog.

I keep running across MD innovators in their thirties. They want nothing to do
with old ways of doing things. Today I spoke to Jay Parkinson, MD, 32 year old
founder of a new web program, HelloHealth.com. It debuts in June, 2008.

HelloHealth.com will be an online site allowing doctors and patients to talk to
each other. There will be no third party, no doctor’s office, no office staff,
no health plan. All patients will need to talk to their doctor will be a
personal phone call. Parkinson envisions a mobile neighborhood service. Doctors
will make house alls and work calls, whatever is most convenient to patients.

Parkinson is a 32 year old year old who cut his teeth on computers at age 5. He
graduated from Washington University Medical School, did a residency in
pediatrics, and restricts his practice to the under 40 crowd (average age, 27).
His patients come from Gen Y, those under 30. His patients are largely artists,
writers, artisans, freelancers, digital media folk and other young
professionals in his Williamsburg, Brooklyn neighborhood.

Parkinson regards patients as online pals. They trust him and each other, but
tend to distrust those in the medical establishment over 40. Parkinson is big
news these days. He’s the cover boy in the most recent issue of Hospital and
Health Networks, HH&N, the American Hospital Association’s main
publication, “America’s most wired healthcare magazine.” HH&N dubbed him
“Dr. IM” (IM is Instant Messaging) on its cover and ran a 2300 word article
“Your Future Chief of Staff?” Among the young MD entrepreneurial crowd, that’s
an impressive and memorable debut.

Dr. Parkinson is six months into his practice, has 3000 active patients, and
makes 8 visits a day to his clients, Half of patients are uninsured and
willingly pay his $150 to $200 fee. Parkinson never leaves ZIP code. You
communicate with him by email, text messaging, or by cell phone video, not by
snail mail.

Dr. Parkinson answers phone calls in person. He says his clients are responsive
and comfortable with the convenience of online neighborhood care, and often
refer their friends to him.

Gen Y, he asserts, want understandable, transparent, and, above all, convenient
care. They seek the same level of service they get from banks and other
commercial firms. They don’t balk at online care. They expect it.

When patients need a specialist or a surgeon, or a hospital or free standing
clinic, Dr. Parkinson is ready. He has done his homework and knows prices and
quality. Of his approach, he says, “Keeping in touch with clients is cool. I
think it is quite revolutionary.”

HelloHealth.com is venture backed. This online service will guide patients to a
pleasant consumer experience, provide free generic drugs when needed, negotiate
discounts from neighborhood merchants, provide personal access to physicians.
For doctors, Hello Health will allow provide more freedom, more money, closer
patient relationships, and more personal care.

Personally, as someone well beyond 40, of an age where I
may come down at any moment with a chronic disease requiring coordinated
comprehensive care, I’m dubious about HelloHealth.com, perhaps because I may be
moving soon towards HelloDisease.com, or even HelloDeath.com.

Besides, as time passes by, I may have to trust somebody over 30, even over 40.
Sir William Osler once said, tongue-in-cheek, that we ought to eliminate
everybody over 40 to make health care more efficient. Fortunately, we’re not
there yet.

The HH & N article doesn’t restrict its comments on online medicine to
Parkinson. It also cites the work of Dr. Allen Wenner, a South Carolina primary
care doctor. He developed the Instant Medical History where patients can tell
their story using structured clinical algorithms

Dr. Parkinson’s online concept reminds me of the young lad who, after mastering
hands-on bicycle riding, lets loose of the handlebars, looks at mother, and
yells, “Look, Maw, no hands!” In Parkinson’s case, it’s no office, no staff, no
paperwork, and presumably no problems, provided he doesn’t fall off his bike and
his patients don’t need to go off-line.

I wish Dr. Parkinson luck. He is a great geek and a fine doctor, and extremely
innovative. All cash may be a bit rash, but it might just work, for the young
and healthy at least.

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